Mike Jensen, writing in today’s Philadelphia about a legendary high school runner: “Her left foot hurt her sometimes in the front ‘near the toes,’ but only when she walked, not running. (Could it have been her Adidas LA trainers?)”
In these parts, we would still normally say “running shoes,” or maybe “sneakers,” but I have the feeling we have not heard the last of trainers.
notoneoffbritishisms.com 
“LA Trainer” is the name of the shoe so it is more a failure to capitalize in the editing.
Trainers! Thank you! I hope it becomes a true Britishism because I really can’t stand the word “sneakers”…although it’s easier to sneak around in trainers vs high heels 🙂
Interesting you should bring that up, Ella. I’ve long been puzzled by the apparent contradiction of “High Heel Sneakers”, of which Tommy Tucker sang (and the Stones covered), wondering what on earth they looked like.
It is more likely because Adidas named that style of shoe the “LA Trainer”. Some online stores advertise it as the tautologous “LA Trainer sneaker”.
When you start hearing them referred to as plimsolls you’ll know the British have really arrived.
I’d plump for pumps.
And there was me thinking that the word ‘trainer’ had come to Britain from the USA … 🙂
I call them runners. Later I learned trainers and sneakers, but never adopted either. I think this is typical of the region (west of Ireland).
Plimsolls are a totally different thing though! This is a plimsoll: http://www.marksandspencer.com/Marks-and-Spencer-Slip-On-Plimsolls/dp/B001OAEO3Y?extid=TP_2_FRO_T_MSF_&pup_c=gs
The larger issue here is Mike Jensen’s poor grammar, not simply his affected use of the word ‘trainers’.
There was a powerup in two Nintendo 64 games called Turbo Trainers. They do exactly what you think they do. The games were Banjo-Kazooie (1998) and Banjo-Tooie (2000), and they were released worldwide so I wonder if this was one of the early sightings in America?
Those games were developed by Rare, a British developer, so not much of a surprise to find a Britishism in it.
@ Stan. In South Wales they were known as ‘Daps’ when I was a kid. A quick Googling tells me they still are. No one seems to know why.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plimsoll_shoe